Free RuneWarriors by James Jennewein Page B

her face and conceal her revulsion.
    â€œI’m feeling poorly, m’lord,” she said quickly, clutching her belly as if ill. “Something I ate disagrees with me. I should take my leave.”
    â€œBy all means,” Thidrek purred. “Tend to thy health, dear girl. So that one day we may dance again.”
    â€œIt shall be an honor, sire,” she said, and then excused herself with a curtsy, turned, and walked off, relieved to be free of him.
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    Moments later, having watched this last with some concern, Grelf arrived at Thidrek’s side and asked if they should save a slice of elderberry pie for him, though he really only wanted to be sure his master hadn’t been rattled by the girl’s rudeness. His nostrils flaring, Thidrek saidnothing, fixing his gaze on the girl as she disappeared past the torchlit line of dancers and into the shadows of the village beyond. Noticing the possessiveness in Thidrek’s stare, a look he’d too often seen before, Grelf issued a naughty smile.
    â€œCaught your eye, has she, m’lord?” Grelf asked airily.
    The look Thidrek gave him in return suggested that she might have caught more than that.

CHAPTER NINE
LIFE IS TORN ASUNDER
    D ane couldn’t sleep. He lay in his bed-straw, tossing and turning, his mind astir. No matter how hard he tried to think of other things, images of Jarl and Thidrek whirled through his head, making sleep impossible. Worse, he cursed the gods for having let him down. Odin? Thor? How foolish he’d been to have ever believed in their powers. And how dare his father force him to honor them? If they were truly powerful, they’d have helped him win that day, but clearly they cared little for him or his dreams. No one understood him, it seemed—his own father least of all.
    His confidence shaken by the loss to Jarl and driven by a rebellious impulse to strike back at his father—to steal his power—Dane rose and went to take the one thing his father most revered. And, slipping it beneath his coat, Dane crept from the house, moving through the village inthe moonlight, careful not to wake the sheep and goats in their pens, nor the dogs that lay asleep. The air was thick with the smell of wood smoke that rose from each of the homes’ hearth fires. Soon he stood outside Astrid’s home, a modest log hut built into the side of a hill. Flik, flik, flik. He tossed pebbles against the shutters, hoping to wake her without raising the ire of her father. As fortune would have it, Blek had drunk too much mead at the feast and was snoring soundly. But Astrid had been very much awake and heard the tip-tap of the stones. In a trice she slipped out the door, a fur wrapped over her underthings, and joined him in the moonlight, her pack of axes on her back. Wordlessly, he took her hand in his and disappeared with her into the woods.
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    A tingle ran through her as she moved under the towering firs, Dane at her side, leading her by the hand, their bodies casting moon-shadow shapes along the ground. There was a special kind of excitement in meeting him like this, away from the prying eyes of the elders.
    â€œI think we’re alone now,” she heard Dane say.
    They stood at the edge of the woods, the smell of the pine needles like perfume in the air, the night sky above them a dome of glittering stars. The moon, rising just over the trees, shone clear and bright. Below them lay the silver oval of a frozen lake blanketed in new-fallen snow. They watched in silence as a mother deer and her young fawns made their way across the lake, leaving a line oftiny hoofprints in the snow.
    â€œIt’s beautiful,” said Astrid in a hushed whisper.
    â€œYou’re beautiful,” he told her, squeezing her hand and drawing her closer.
    â€œAnd you’re a fool who’d say anything for a kiss.”
    â€œI can’t deny it. I do dream of a kiss…and more.”
    They fell silent. The only